Playing with Fire
by ObookNorth
Summary: Moriarty is back.  Is Sherlock and John's new relationship strong enough to survive?  Established relationship, Sherlock/John.  Rated M, for Sexy times, dominance play, etc.  Based on my Three Patch Problem.
1. Chapter 1

(Warning for Aggressive sexy times)

"Hello Mrs. Hudson!" Greg Lestrade smiled his most charming smile as he walked through the front hallway of 221 Baker Street. Mrs. Hudson popped her head around the corner of her flat and gestured excitedly at the DI. "Lestrade! Why don't you pop in for a moment! I have jam tarts cooling right now and I think the boys are distracted right now." There was a thump upstairs as if furniture was being moved around, and Mrs. Hudson looked at the ceiling with mild concern.

Lestrade ran his hand through his silver hair. He had never thought of Sherlock as the sort who would take to the idea of redecorating. Must be John's influence, he thought as he smiled down at her. "Don't get me wrong Mrs. Hudson, I'd love one, but I really have to see Sherlock. He's…" he lowered his voice. "He's not going to like this."

There was a thump and a shout from upstairs. "GET ON YOUR KNEES SHERLOCK, DAMN IT."

Greg was up the stairs and running without thinking, drawing his gun as he entered the upstairs flat.

The room was trashed, for lack of a better word. Papers and books were strewn everywhere, and several chairs, including John's were knocked on their side. Sherlock was kneeling on the coffee table, breathing heavily, his face slightly flushed. He was held in position by a fist in his hair, and the barrel of a gun was pressed to his temple.

Lestrade's eyes widened in horror as he saw Sherlock's attacker. John Watson was holding the gun easily with a downright predatory expression on his normally mild, friendly face. "If I hear you say bored one more time, Sherlock…"

"John! What the hell!" Lestrade shouted, raising his gun to the shorter man. He could imagine that living with a bored Sherlock would get irritating, but…

John yelped, dropped his gun, and dove behind his armchair. Now that he was in control of the situation the DI came to a startling realization. Sherlock's blue dressing gown was open, and he was both naked and visibly erect underneath. "Oh God," the consulting detective muttered with disdain. "And things were just getting interesting. Please tell me you have something for me that will make up for it, Lestrade."

Sherlock didn't seem to particularly mind his state of undress, and stood up on the coffee table before stepping down to the couch, the furl of his dressing gown revealing that his penis was even more sizable when seen in profile and that he had bite mark on his thigh that Lestrade promptly attempted to scrub from his memory with disinfectant.

"It's unloaded." John said weakly from behind the chair. "I check it several times before we, uh…"

"Not that he would pull the trigger anyway." Sherlock said, resigned to the fact that the DI would need a little reassurance before the purpose of his visit was revealed. "It is the whole point behind the whole exercise; reassuring John that he would not pull the trigger on me by mistake."

"That didn't look like the point to me," Lestrade muttered, sliding his gun back in the holster. Sherlock smirked and nodded to John who stood up, turned his chair up right, and, as is customary in Britain when one really doesn't know what to say, dashed off to the kitchen to make tea. The transformation was startling, when he had been standing over Sherlock with the gun, John's movements had been smooth, almost mechanical, and now he was bustling around like an overwrought house-wife. Lestrade tried not to notice that Sherlock was staring after the smaller man with narrowed, slightly glazed eyes and that there was still the hint of a pink flush on his chest.

"While I'm touched that you would go out of your way to protect my virtue Lestrade, there must be another reason for your visit. I assume it is serious but not urgent, as you are about to sit down. It probably has something to do with me in particular, as you were acting protective enough to narrow your focus on John's aggressive behavior without noticing my erection despite the fact that you are aware that John and I have been "shagging" as you put it, for four months now."

Lestrade fulfilled Sherlock's prediction and sat down in the armchair, which apparently sagged into the back without a cushion. "For the record, Sherlock, I knew about the shagging, but I didn't know about the kink. That was a little startling. And unorthodox."

"You're avoiding telling me exactly what is going on." Sherlock stopped staring after John, pulling himself from his aroused state sharply and refocusing his attention on Lestrade. "What is it. It must be bad."

Lestrade drew in a breath. "Sherlock. Moriarty is alive. I'm not sure how, and I'm not sure why we haven't heard of it before now. But there have been whispers, and we know that whispers that speak of Moriarty are usually true."

"Novel." Sherlock murmured. "I was skeptical. I didn't think he would kill himself so easily. But I'm surprised that he was able to fake it so thoroughly that even I wasn't able to tell whether or not the body was alive."

John came in with three cups on a tray, offering one to Lestrade. His jaw was set, and he was silent, sitting on the other end of the couch. Lestrade sipped his tea and became increasingly uncomfortable as the two men stared into space, lost in their own thoughts. It was strangely intimate, they didn't touch but the expressions on their faces complemented each other's. John's face was stoic, his jaw set, eyes hard and determined, Sherlock's oddly wistful, as if considering an abusive lover that he had been mind-numbingly attracted to.

"I'd have thought the two of you would be more surprised."

"Very little surprises me. John and I have discussed this possibility before. If I decided to fake my death, it is only natural to assume that Jim Moriarty, whether he be consulting criminal impersonating an actor, or actor taking on the role of consulting criminal, would fake his own."

"You took down his web though. Will he be weakened?"

"He took out the main strands." John said, grimly, "But there are bound to be some leftovers. This is assuming that Moriarty would want his web back in the first place. We do not know what he wants. He may want his power back, or he may be more focused on revenge."

"Or he may be bored again." Sherlock's voice was full of breathy longing.

"It'll be difficult keeping you down to earth if that's the case," John muttered, grimacing. He shoved crumpled fabric at his flatmate. "And put on your pants, you nutter, you're putting Greg off his tea."


	2. Chapter 2

(Okay, I thought that writing in third person would be easier, but damn it, I like their voices too much! Also, Sherlock Holmes is not mine.)

**JOHN WATSON**

I could still feel the heat in my face as I picked up the papers and chairs that had been knocked over in what Sherlock Holmes described as "a bit of a grapple" when he propositioned me. Sherlock stretched out on the couch and looked at me significantly, canting his hips once as I pointedly avoided eye contact. For me, the interruption and the mention of Moriarty had relocated all thoughts along those lines to a small, dark cupboard at the back of my brain. He shrugged and slapped a nicotine patch onto the inside of his forearm and breathed out slowly, steepling his fingers, lost in thought.

We never really talk about the time I thought he was dead and he was out hunting Moriarty's web, at least not in terms of emotions. We've planned a little; I have a document on my computer with a "What if Moriarty Comes Back" list, but from both Sherlock and my own perspective there are too many contradictions on the list for anything to actually be put into action. Sherlock wants to send me to some small island that Mycroft has access to in the Pacific ocean if he returns so that I am (hopefully) not a target, while I want to quit my job and literally hover over him with my gun at the ready until I shoot that bastard and have his head on a platter. I refuse to let Sherlock die again, neither in a make believe game nor in reality.

"Sherlock, we need to talk about this." I lifted his feet and sat with my lap under them. He kneaded my legs gently with his toes before relaxing into the couch as the nicotine took effect.

"Dull." He murmured.

"Oh come on Sherlock, we never talk about it. You just came back one day; I woke up, walked into the living room and you were spaced out on the sofa like you are now. I thought I was going a bit crazed with loneliness as I'd just broken up with my girlfriend a month before, so I sat in my chair and read my paper until you started babbling about the decomposition of dead maggots, and it really wasn't the sort of conversation I'd imagine my subconscious having with me, so I assumed that somehow you were alive. I would have punched you out if you hadn't started grinning like an idiot."

Sherlock snorted. "Saying 'Right then' and getting up to make us tea was not the reception I was expecting."

"What else do you do when your mad flat mate comes back from the dead? They don't exactly have how-to books on that sort of thing."

"I was at least expecting a kiss. Then it took me months to finally drag one out of you."

I looked down, grinning, "I missed you, you know that."

"I assumed so when I heard you sobbing like a baby in your room later that day. You do realize you could have done that around me. Just because I don't understand emotions the way you do doesn't mean I'd mock you for them in a situation like that."

I'm quiet for a long moment. Sherlock's insistence that he's obsessed with me rather than in love with me is probably true, though he's high functioning enough as a sociopath to recognize that our relationship is more than him trapping me in a corner so that I can't leave him. Still, he acknowledgment that he still doesn't quite get it jarred me a bit.

During my silence Sherlock begins rubbing my legs with his feet again so that I finally glance over at him. He let his head loll to the side, his Adam's apple bobbed, and his eyes widen. He looked sweet, a little naïve, and endearing. For a second my mouth dried, and I felt myself licking my lips before I shook myself out of it. Calculating. He wants my attention away from the conversation and probably back on his cock.

"You never did tell me the details when you came back. You told me you took down most of Moriarty's web, but not what pieces. Is anything left of it?"

"Oh god John. Fine. While I was in Europe and Asia I took down three smuggling rings, one human trafficking ring (both actual human slaves and body parts, they were fairly open to ideas), killed ten professional hit men, and stopped 8 serious insurance fraud schemes. I was seriously injured twice, tortured once, and had the 'pleasure' of having two other people tortured while I watched. I got the main players, but not everyone, no. For example, threads of Moriarty remain in Africa, I'm fairly sure, but I didn't travel there, nor did I travel to Australia."

My eyes widen. "Tortured?"

"Don't look at me like I'm a maimed kitten. They needed me alive so they didn't push me as hard as they might have."

I know better than to ask about the other people he was made to watch being tortured. Sherlock's moral compass isn't exactly a popular vacation destination in my book, though he usually ends up getting things done for the benefit of the most people.

"So if Moriarty's back, he'll be working with less, but he'll still be working with something."

Sherlock nods. "It will be interesting to say the least."

I set my jaw, preparing for his reaction. "You missed him. Moriarty I mean." It's not quite a question.

"Oh yes," Sherlock breathes.

I close my eyes, a sickening feeling clenching my stomach. A bit not good, Sherlock Holmes.


	3. Chapter 3

**SHERLOCK HOLMES**

I used to sleep on the couch. It was too claustrophobic for me to sleep in my bedroom, and honestly I didn't think much would change if I was having sex with him. But at some point in the last month, John started to mutter about how it was ridiculous to have two rooms if we were just going to end up in bed together anyway, and I informed Mrs. Hudson that she could rent out his room. It wasn't as though I used it on a regular basis anyway.

The first night he slept there, with his jumpers in a pile in the corner, and his medical books balanced precariously on my dresser, I waited, just outside the door to my room. I remembered how, months ago, I would wait until John fell into deep REM, then sneak into his room, watching him sleep. I remembered that the third step and the fifth had a squeak that it was imperative to avoid.

Then I peeked around the corner of the door, and watched John settle into my bed.

He knew I was watching, and pointedly ignored it as he read a chapter of a novel, got up one last time to go to the restroom (pointedly staring straight ahead as he walked past me, as if he thought that if he made eye contact with me he'd startle me), and then curled up in bed, with his face defensively to the door as he fell asleep like a good soldier. For once he made pointed eye contact with me. "Want to come to bed too, Sherlock?"

Momentarily I recalled the safe warmth of his back that I woke up to when I fell asleep after we had sex. It seemed an oddly luxurious sensation to indulge in when I had experiments to work on and a composition to fiddle with. I shook my head. "I have work to do," I claimed, and walked out to the sitting room where I worked on an experiment until 3 in the morning, and then curled up on the couch out of habit, though I was surprised that I could no longer find the warm spot that usually helped me relax and fall asleep for a couple hours so I would be able to function the next day. I finally dozed in ten minute chunks, stretched out and oddly stressed at the niggling thought that something was missing until at 7 in the morning something warm pushed against my back. I felt a rough hand smoothing my shirt against my arm and drifting gently around my midsection.

"John?" I was tired, so tired, my voice had no edge to it, the word was soft and formless.

"What on earth goes on in your brain," he murmured, and it was not a question he intended on me answering. "You look so gentle and soft right now." My eyes narrowed slightly in irritation, but I sighed softly as he pushed my hair back and planted a kiss on my forehead. "Let's get you into a proper bed, Sherlock."

His attention had relaxed muscles I usually didn't pay much attention to, and I found myself staggering to my feet, following him into my room.

OoOoOoOoOoOo

The next night, at midnight, he quietly came up behind me and removed the pipette from my hand as I was standing over a rack of test-tubes. "Bed," he said firmly, "For at least four hours every night. You can't chase criminals around if you don't sleep." He handed me my pajamas, and despite some incredibly verbose objections on my part, stood over me (how does a man 6 inches shorter than me manage to stand OVER me) with his arms crossed as I changed and got into bed, fuming, lying on the side of the bed farthest from the door with my arms crossed.

My objections became particularly garrulous as I began to get bored (I'm just lying here John, I have other things to do, stop watching me like a bloody hawk, you'd think I was planning a prison break the way you're looking at me, dull people like you don't understand what it's like to not be able to shut your brain off, there really isn't an point to this). Finally, he gave a grunt of irritation from where he was half sitting in bed listening to my diatribe, and leaned over, pressing my shoulders to the bed.

"Shut up, Sherlock. This isn't just about your inability to sleep. I don't sleep well anymore unless I know you're next to me and not running off on some damn fool suicide mission. So be quiet, read a book if you have to, but at least let one of us sleep tonight."

There's always something I don't pick up on. Of course, a captain doesn't sleep well unless he knows his regiment is safe. John had to sleep because I was obsessed with John and John was necessary, and John was more human than I and more in need of sleep, so I didn't move.

I often browse the internet with my phone or read a book now while he sleeps. It's foolish to try and sneak past him, if he doesn't wake up he seems to notice something is missing and invariably sinks into one of his nightmares.

And of course, tonight, after our extensive discussion of Moriarty, it is not surprising at all when he walks into the room with his gun and a cartridge, loads it, gives me a significant look to be sure I am paying attention to its location, and places it on the bedside table.

Tonight I am sure to press my body up against him as he falls asleep, though I will admit to being distracted, searching the internet for some whisper or hint of Moriarty's whereabouts.

I don't find anything until 3am.


End file.
